Five on a Platter
by knapper
Summary: A Forensic Anthropologist draws Goren's attention while the Detectives investigate a very cold case. Chapter 6 up. They blended in with all the other couples out strolling along the waterfront.
1. Chapter 1

Title: Five on a Platter

Disclaimers: Not mine, except for Laura.

Author's Note: I beta my own stuff, so the errors are mine.

Chapter 1 - Day One

The call came just as I was settling in for a quiet night of mindless television. It was my first call out as the forensic anthropologist for the Medical Examiner's Office. Normally, my consulting activities are confined to laboratory examinations but occasionally I'm asked to examine remains in situ.

The old warehouse was marked by squad cars and the ME's van. As I exited my vehicle a station wagon emblazoned with the logo of the ME's office stopped beside me. I waited for Dr. Elizabeth Rodgers to emerge from her car.

"Hi Laura," she said with a wry grin. "I see we didn't waste any time putting you to work."

"You know me I get bored easily."

I've known Liz for well over fifteen years. We had met at a forensic conference and kept in touch through the years. When I finally decided to quit wandering the world's hot spots, she kindly put in a word with her boss. I had family and friends scattered around the State, and I had consulted for quite a few of the Medical Examiners along the eastern seaboard, so New York seemed like a good place for me to settle down. It also helped that Hudson University was looking to add a new professor to its Anthropology Department, and fortunately for me, they liked my credentials and the high profile nature of some my previous work.

I clipped my newly minted ID to my coat and followed her into the building along with the two ME technicians. They were old hands at this. I'd been introduced before, but couldn't remember their names. We followed the sound of voices to the right rear corner and joined a small knot of people standing in front of a gaping hole.

"DiNovi" Rodgers stopped in front of an older detective. "Is this one yours?"

"No thank god," he said. "Major Case is on the way."

"Who?" Rodgers asked.

"Eames and Goren." DiNovi smirked at her.

"Oh lord..." Rodgers sighed and rolled her eyes. To me she said, "You're in for a treat."

"Why?" I asked.

"Goren's a pai...interesting character. I'll warn you, he likes to examine the crime scene...in minute detail, but he knows his stuff. " She turned to look at me thoughtfully. "Actually, you're a lot alike."

"Gee, thanks Liz." I said acerbically. "How often have you described me as being a 'pain in the ass'?"

Rodgers pushed her way through the hole instead of answering my question. The space was narrow, only about four feet wide, and twenty feet long. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to construct the narrow tomb. The floor was scattered with construction debris; old timbers, bricks, empty bags that had once contained mortar, and sand, lots and lots of sand.

Rodgers' cell rang, so while she answered her call, I approached the bodies and examined the scene. There were five bodies that had decayed until only bits of cloth, dried flesh and bones remained. The bones were articulated in their anatomical position. That told me that the bodies had been intact when they were placed here. I started at the feet, and worked my way up the leg bones to the pelvis, through the vertebrae and ribs to the clavicle and scapulas, down the arms to the hands. They were intact...if you didn't count the four that were missing their skulls.

* * *

Goren was waiting in the lobby when Eames pulled to the curb. He dashed through the cold wet night and into the warmth of the SUV. He was his usually scruffy self; unshaven, and baggy-eyed. He was wearing a heavy raincoat, and his watch cap was pulled down over his ears.

"Hey," He said as he settled into his seat and stretched his jean clad legs.

"There's coffee," Eames pointed at the steaming cup in the holder on his side of the vehicle.

"Thanks, Eames."

She nodded, and put the vehicle in motion. "Did you find out anything else?"

"Not much," He flipped open his portfolio. "Demolition crew found the bodies behind a false wall. ME should already be there."

"And, how did we get so lucky?"

"Site is owned by..." He glanced down at the information he'd written. "Sydney Robertson Developments. Robertson is the Deputy Mayor's brother-in-law."

"Oh crap," Eames snorted. Eames hated the Deputy Mayor. He was an officious little twirp that had an unusual attachment to the Chief of Detectives. "And I bet he won't have a clue as to how five bodies ended up hidden in the building."

"They never do."

The rest of the drive passed in silence. Goren stared out the window watching the city pass while Eames piloted the big SUV through the streets.

* * *

Rodgers finished her phone call and now stood beside me, doing the exact same visual scan I had just completed. "No skulls..." she made a small surprised sound. "Well," she continued rather cheerily. "Doesn't look like much for me..."

"Excuse me?"

"We're shorthanded tonight, otherwise I wouldn't be here, and I've got a triple homicide with actual bleeding bodies on the other side of town. I think you can handle this one on your own. I"ll leave Phil & Gene with you."

"Liz!" I couldn't believe she was throwing me in the deep end of the pool.

She paused, and turned to me. "You sure as hell don't need me to tell you how to recover skeletal remains. Just remember the bodies are ours and don't let anyone tell you different." And then she turned and marched away.

For several minutes, I stood there with my hands on my hips contemplating the tips of my booted feet until a commotion at the doorway drew my attention. Four other people had crowded through the hole and were milling around. They all wore jackets with Crime Scene Unit stencilled across the back.

"Freeze, right there." I snapped. "Who's in charge?"

"I am." He was young, confident. "Bill Watson. Who are you?"

"I'm Laura Westfall, the forensic anthropologist." I folded my arms and stared him down. "I need another fifteen minutes with the bodies before you can bring your team in."

"Look, Dr Westfall..." he began in a patronizing tone, "we need to start processing..."

"You can process when I release the bodies. And until I do, I'd like you and your team to wait outside."

"I'm sorry Dr..." he began again but I cut him off.

"Actually, I prefer Professor. I'm a PhD not an MD. And the longer you stand here arguing with me the longer you'll be here."

He stared me up and down, pursed his lips, thought about it for a few more seconds, and determined that I wasn't giving in. I also knew that Rodgers had probably ordered him to give me some space before she'd left the building and it wouldn't do to piss off a senior Medical Examiner. She could, and would, make his life hell at every crime scene he worked if he didn't obey. He turned and walked back out and the other members of his team followed.

Phil and Gene exchanged amused looks and Phil gave me the thumbs up. I winked back at them. "Let me know when my fifteen minutes are up."

"Sure thing, Professor."

I returned to the bones. I was looking to see if I could determine sex, race, height and cause of death. Height was fairly obvious, you just had to adjust for the four missing heads. The easiest way to determine sex is by examining the pelvis. The pubic arch in males, where the two halves of the pelvis join at the front of the body, is like an inverted V and very narrow; in females the junction is wider and shallower, more U-shaped. Females also have a broader, shallower pelvic cavity. Fortunately, I had all five pelvises to work with and for the most part they were devoid of flesh. I quickly determined that I had four males and one female.

I also determined that the smallest skeleton was a male juvenile. The epiphysis of long bones of the arms and legs hadn't fused indicating to me that he was younger than 14 or 15. Given his small size I judged him to be no more than 12. The other skeletons belonged to adults. The female may have been as young as mid-twenties, but the males were all older individuals. I would confirm and refine the age estimates in the lab when I had more time to examine all the bones under a microscope.

Race was going to be a tricker proposition. Generally, I would start with examining the morphology of the skull but as four of them were missing I would have to rely on examining the other bones of the body and that would take longer. Fortunately, I thought the remains were preserved enough to provide us with material for DNA testing that could give us a racial profile, but that could take weeks.

* * *

When Eames pulled up to the crime scene, she parked amongst the other assorted vehicles; a couple of squad cars with their lights lazily rotating, the Crime Scene Unit's van, the ME's van and a small red 4X4.

"Nice truck" Eames nodded with her chin. "Any idea who it belongs to?"

Goren pouted and shook his head. He pulled his badge from his pocket and clipped it to his coat. "Detectives Eames and Goren." He gave their names to the patrolman guarding the door. "Where are we?"

"Back and to the right," The patrolman pointed over his shoulder. "You can't miss it Detective. There'll be a crowd standing around watching some else do all the work."

The building had been stripped. Most of the walls were gone, flooring had been ripped away, and only a few lighting fixtures remained. In its heyday, way back when, the four storey brick building had housed a furniture manufacturer. Then it had become a warehouse. Now it was slated for demolition to make way for a high rise condominium.

Eames and Goren rounded a corner and came upon a knot of technicians and a couple of uniformed officers hovering outside a huge hole ripped in the end wall.

"What's going on?" Goren asked.

CSU Tech Watson turned to face him. "Dr. Rodgers got called away to a triple homicide, so she left the Forensic Anthropologist in charge. She won't let us touch anything until she's finished poking around."

"How long have you been waiting out here," Eames asked.

"About fifteen minutes," He checked his watch and shrugged.

"Well, I'm not waiting." Eames said flatly. She stepped through the hole and Goren followed along. When Eames stepped into the room, one of the ME's technicians spoke up. "Professor, the Detectives are here."

The bodies were at the far end of the room. A woman knelt among the bare bones, gently probing them with gloved hands. She glanced up and then reluctantly stood and waved them in. "Watch where you step."

"Gee," Eames' voice dripped sarcasm. "I never would've thought of that." She glanced at Goren to see what his reaction was but, typical of him, he was busy studying the woman. Thank god some things hadn't changed, she thought.

The other woman gave a slight shrug. "Sorry, I've been instructing students for the past four months and I forget that some people actually know what they're doing."

Eames grunted apologizing for her sarcasm.

"Laura Westfall," She carefully stepped carefully over the remains, pulling off one glove as she approached them. "I'm the new forensic anthropologist." She stuck her hand out for Eames to take.

"Alex Eames." Eames briefly clasped the other woman's hand.

"Robert Goren." He captured the woman's hand in his big paw. She was a pretty little thing, not much taller than Eames. Her short red hair was held back by the glasses perched on her head. Her battered oilcloth coat was open revealing a green t-shirt and faded denims. It was similar to the outfit Eames was wearing, except Eames wore a short stylish trench coat that was more uptown...and she wasn't wearing cowboy boots. Goren held the anthropologist's hand, a second more than was necessary, and then released her.

As he snapped on latex gloves and stepped towards the nearest body, the anthropologist turned her green eyes on him. "Hands on type, are we?"

"Uh...yeah."

Behind him he heard Eames mutter, "You have no idea." The comment was no doubt accompanied by her rolling her eyes.

"Go ahead," Westfall waved a hand over the remains as an invitation to examine the evidence.

He lowered himself to one knee and observed the body. The bones lay buried in a shallow layer of sand. Those he could see were in their anatomical position. There was still scraps of rotten clothing clinging to the body. He gently lifted one corner of the shirt to peer underneath. There was still tissue under the protective layer, but it was so dry it looked like old leather. And, the most telling piece of information was the missing skull.

"What do you think?" she finally asked.

Goren looked up at her. Was she testing him or was it a dare?

"Adult male, no obvious signs of trauma. Some tissue remaining but its desiccated. Skull is missing. Been here maybe two or three years but no more than five."

"How did you come up with that time line?" she asked surprised.

"Building was in regular use up until five years ago. I think someone would've noticed the smell."

"Ah," she smiled at him. "Someone who does his homework."

"I don't suppose you found the skull," he peered around the area.

"Nope," she said. "We've got four adults, three male and one female. The fifth is a male juvenile and he's the only one that still has his head." Westfall pointed at each body in turn as she spoke. "I'll narrow down the ages and confirm race when I get them back to the lab.

"And the only skull belongs to the child." He propped his elbow on his knee and rested his chin on his fist. "Interesting."

"I thought so," She turned slightly so she could see the other bodies. "John the Baptist on a platter?"

He looked up startled. She'd just given voice to his own thought. "They took the heads to provide proof of death. That's...excessive."

"Why take the adult's heads but not the child's," Eames asked.

"Maybe they didn't think he was important," Goren shrugged. "Maybe they didn't think he could be tied back to the murders."

"What about cause of death?" Eames asked.

Westfall had folded her arms across her chest and was staring at the remains at her feet. Her thoughts were a million miles away, she was obviously contemplating something and she hadn't heard Eames' question.

"Professor?" Goren rose to his feet. He leaned over trying to catch her attention and then gently touched her arm. "Professor Westfall."

She startled and shook her head to shake off the daze. "Sorry...what was the question?"

"Cause of death?" Eames asked again.

"I didn't find any obvious signs of trauma." She shrugged. "But I'll have to clean the bones up to get a good look at them. I'll know in a day or two."

"Can we get a facial reconstruction on the juvenile?" Goren asked. "We might be able to identify him through a school photo. That might lead us back to the adults. The woman could be his mother."

Westfall lifted one shoulder. "I've got a grad student who should be able to get you something. He's working with some new software that's quite good."

"What about DNA?" Eames asked.

Westfall nodded. "Shouldn't be a problem, but it'll take time. If we can't get samples from the remaining tissue, we should be able to pull some from the bone marrow and we can use tooth pulp for the boy."

"Sorry, but I better let the troops in," she said as she stepped back towards the ragged doorway, "otherwise I'll have a mutiny on my hands." She disappeared through the hole and they could hear her giving instructions.

"What do you think?" Eames asked.

"She seems to know what she's doing," Goren answered as he walked cautiously around the bodies for another look.

Eames ducked her head, letting her hair hide the smile on her face. That wasn't what she meant at all, but she thought it was really interesting that's what he thought.

* * *

Goren and Eames hung around while we excavated the first of the bodies. Eames wandered off to interview the demolition crew leaving Goren to watch over the forensics unit and me. And, he was damn hard to ignore.

He was a big man; six foot three or four, so I could have tucked myself neatly under his chin with room to spare. He had removed his knit cap to reveal greying short hair, but I could tell if he let it grow it would be a mass of unruly curls.

He radiated a sense of weariness, not a physical tiredness, but a fatigue of the soul. I only noticed because it was the same sense of exhaustion that had plagued me not too long ago.

There was steel there too and I'd bet money that he could be a stubborn son-of-a-bitch. And, if he was anything like the other police officers I knew, he could be ruthless too.

I watched him interact with the forensic people as he pointed out things he wanted photographed, or items that needed collecting. He was unfailingly polite. They were use to him invading their turf, and they took his instructions with good humour.

As Phil and Gene placed the final few bones of the juvenile victim in the body bag, Goren cautiously stepped over to where I was teasing the remains of the another victim from the sand, and dropped to one knee. "Can I ask a question?" he said quietly.

"Sure." I looked up. He had a round face, big brown eyes, and a nose that was slightly too small for his face. It gave him a boyish appearance. He needed a shave, but he struck me as the type who had a five o'clock shadow that showed up sometime around two, so it was probably his natural state.

"When you...zoned out back there where did you go?" he asked.

I lowered my eyes, just for a second, and then returned them to his face. He just waited, and I knew he would wait for as long as it took for him to get an answer out of me. I sighed. "We worked a mass grave in Rwanda...ten bodies, men and women, and no skulls. There were rumours...we never found solid proof...about this Warlord who would give his soldiers lists of people to kill. The soldiers would decapitate them and return the heads to him as proof that they had completed the job."

His eyes flicked down, to the headless corpse I was excavating, and then back up to me.

"Deja vu?"

"Something like that." I gave him a weak smile. "Some days this job really sucks."

He observed me with compassionate eyes. He didn't answer but his eyes said, 'I've been there too'.

"I'm done," Eames suddenly called from the doorway. "Are you ready to go?"

"Uhm...just a second." He took a business card from his portfolio and held it between two outstretched fingers. "Professor, here's my card. Call me as soon as you have anything."

"Of course." I removed the card and stuck it in my back pocket.

"And...uhm...thanks for your help." He smiled slightly, showing white teeth.

"No problem."

He rose and rejoined his partner. Only after he'd disappeared through the hole in the wall did I go back to work.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I wish.

Author's Note: I beta my own. The errors are mine. Thanks to Mary T and DeliriousDancer for the reviews and to Lalunafour for putting me on her 'alerts'. Thanks for the encouragement.

Chapter 2 - Day Two

"Did you get any sleep?" Eames asked as he settled into his desk chair. After they left the crime scene last night, Eames had managed to squeeze in four hours of sleep but it didn't look like her partner had been to bed at all. He had managed to shave, and he was wearing a suit, so if you ignored the steamer trunks beneath his eyes he didn't look half bad. He had probably spent the entire night on the computer instead of sleeping like a normal person.

"A little," he mumbled grumpily. He wasn't about to reveal that he'd slept for a total of forty minutes on his couch. He wished she'd quit pestering him about how much he was or wasn't sleeping, or eating, or everything else. It was starting to get annoying.

"So," Ross stopped on his way into his office and perched on the edge of Eames' desk. "Tell me about this warehouse?"

"In a nutshell," Eames began dryly, "We've got 4 headless adults and one kid found behind a false wall in an old warehouse owned by the Deputy Mayor's brother-in-law. Goren and The Professor figure they've been there between three and five years. Should be a piece of cake."

Goren glanced quickly at her and raised an eyebrow.

"Who's the Professor?" Ross asked.

"Laura Westfall," Goren answered. "She's a forensic anthropologist."

"Right," Ross nodded knowingly. "We've met."

Goren threw a questioning look at the Captain and then quickly glanced away. Eames caught the exchange and repressed a smile.

"The Professor thinks she'll be able to get us a facial reconstruction of the boy in a day or two, and DNA looks good, too." Eames added.

"There was a lot of debris in the..." Goren's hands fluttered like two great butterflies as he searched for the next word. "Tomb. The lab might turn up something for us to go on."

"Sounds to me like this one's got a good coating of frost on it," Ross continued. "Talk to the brother-in-law, see what he says. If you don't come up with something significant in the next week, shelve it."

"Okay." Eames answered. Goren nodded agreement.

Ross walked back to his office and hung up his coat. He could see the two detectives discussing something. So, 'The Great Goren' had finally met the 'Grim Reaper'. He would've loved being a fly on the wall for that meeting. The last woman Goren had met who could think rings around him was that psychotic Australian. Ah well, maybe he'd get to see it one day.

* * *

Eames hung up her phone and muttered something that Goren didn't quite catch. She had just made an appointment for them to meet with the buildings owner, Sydney Robertson.

"He'll _make time_ for us at two o'clock," Eames snapped. "Arrogant son..."

Goren just snorted at her and returned to his computer.

"You've been awfully quiet. What are you up to?"

Goren hit a hotkey to hide the screen and glanced up. He had been rereading one of Laura Westfall's scientific publications. He had spent most of last night running an extensive database search of newspapers articles and scientific papers dealing with her work. He also knew where she'd received her degrees, which professional associations she belonged to, and had been able to piece together her work history over the past twenty years. He was reassured that he was dealing with a professional who knew exactly what she was doing and could get him the information that he...that they needed.

"I put in a request for a search of property and tax records to see what they had on that warehouse," he said. "Maybe it'll give us something else to go on. If the remains are more than two years old, it's unlikely that Robertson knows anything that'll help us."

"Well, that's something," Eames said wistfully. "Means we won't have to deal with the Deputy Mayor."

Goren muttered something about 'small mercies' and returned to his computer when Eames' phone rang. She spoke for a minute and then dropped the phone back into it's cradle.

"Goren, let's go." she said as she jumped from her chair. "That's the ME office. They've already got preliminary results."

* * *

The autopsy door thumped against the wall. Across the room, the woman at the microscope leapt to her feet and turned to face them. Her chair spun a full circle and bumped into the table.

"Damn," she ran a hand through her hair. "You startled me."

"Sorry," Eames apologized. Westfall didn't look any better than Goren did. Her eyes were bloodshot and there were dark circles under them. She was wearing the same clothes she had worn last night. Eames suspected she'd been asleep at the microscope before they walked in.

"Professor," Goren said as he dropped his portfolio on a counter and pulled on latex gloves. "What have you got?"

Westfall was tired and stiff. She had made quick work of determining the race and age of the youngster by examining his skull, but she had spend most of the night measuring the femurs of the decapitated skeletons and running the data through a discriminant analysis on her computer. And then, she double checked every measurement and every key stroke and did it again.

She closed her eyes and sucked in a big breath, stretching her thin t-shirt over her breasts. She shrugged her shoulders and then shook herself like a dog. "Right," Westfall walked to farthest gurney as she spoke. "We've sent samples from the remains to DNA. We're waiting on the results."

"The first body is a white male, aged fifty to fifty-five, height is 6'2. Note the healed fractures on the clavicle and of the fourth and fifth ribs." She touched a series of bones on the right side of the table as she spoke.

Westfall walked over to stand between the next two gurneys, and Goren tagged right along with her. "John Doe Number Two is a black male, aged sixty-five or greater, shows signs of osteoarthritis in his knees and hands, estimated height is 5'6". John Doe Number Three is also a black male, aged thirty-five to forty-five, estimated height is 5'8."

Goren scanned the remains of the younger male, and noted that the bones of the right hand were missing and that the ulna and radius were much shorter than the bones of the left forearm. "Professor, is this an amputation?"

"Its an old injury, but not a medical amputation." She held the ulna in her hands, running one finger over damaged edge. "You see how the distal end is truncated, the edge is slightly crushed, but it shows some bone regrowth."

"Uhm," Goren stood in front of her, head tilted to one side as he examined the lower end of the bone. It ended about four inches above the wrist.

"It's definitely a pre-mortem injury," she said as she replaced the bone. As she moved to the next table, Goren followed closely.

"Jane Doe is a black female, aged twenty-five to thirty, pelvic scarring indicates that she has had children, estimated height is 5'6"." Westfall moved to the youngster's remains, stopped and leaned heavily on the table. "John Doe Number Four is a black juvenile, aged eight to twelve, about 4'10."

"I have not been able to determine cause of death for the adults from the available remains. There are no signs of bullet impacts on any of them, and no cut marks on any of the bones indicating that they were stabbed."

"And the boy?" Eames asked quietly. "Could you determine a COD for him?"

"Strangled." Westfall answered. "What was left of the hyoid bone was crushed."

"Poor kid," Eames sighed sadly. "Any word on our facial reconstruction?"

"Peter's working on it," Westfall answered. "You should have it by the end of the day."

"Is that it?" Goren sounded disappointed. He hovered behind her.

"Not quite," she crooked a finger at him and marched back to the first male's remains. Goren followed along as if tethered to her. "You see these marks... here and here?" She picked up the cervical vertebrae and began pointing.

"Yeah." Goren peered over her left shoulder as she held the bones up so he could see.

"He was decapitated post-mortem...with a machete." She returned the vertebrae to the table then stepped back, nearly colliding with Goren, and crossed her arms. "All the adults were."

"Are you sure?" Goren stepped sideways, and tilted his head so he could see her face.

"Positive," she said sadly.

"So," Goren started thoughtfully, "The limb amputation...machete too?"

"Probably," she nodded. "Typical war injury for someone from Central and East Africa. You might want to see if anyone's missing any immigrants from the region."

"We'll check with INS," Eames said just as her cell phone began ringing. "I've got to get this," she said as she studied the display. The reception was slightly better outside the autopsy suites, so she stepped out into the hall.

Goren was bent over the table examining the white male's remains. "You know I read that paper you wrote," he said quietly. "On exhuming mass graves in Rwanda and Bosnia."

"Really," she said wryly. "I'm surprised anybody has read it."

"I thought the work was...insightful." Goren moved on to John Doe Two. "So, you're an Associate Professor at Hudson."

"You've been checking up on me." She regarded him with narrowed eyes. "If you weren't a cop that would be rather creepy."

"Uhm," he looked up at her and shrugged sheepishly. "Occupational hazard." He lowered his head to the body. "I would've thought someone with your experience would be a full professor."

She raised one eyebrow at the presumptuous statement and pursed her lips. "I am on a tenure track. I've been living out of a suitcase for so long I guess they weren't sure if I was going to stick around."

"And will you?" He looked up from the table and raised an eyebrow at her. "Stick around I mean."

"Yes," she said tiredly and scrubbed a hand across her eyes. "I've done my time on world clean-up. Between the teaching and the consulting I've got enough here to keep me busy."

"Oh, well that's good then." Goren began to move to the next skeleton but found his way blocked by the weary anthropologist. "Excuse me, Professor."

She stepped to one side and he moved right along with her. It was like a tango; if she shifted, so did he. Right or left, it didn't matter, he was right there. It was disconcerting...and sexy as hell at the same time. She lifted her head and found herself staring into deep, brown eyes.

* * *

Eames had finished talking to the forensics lab. They had found two shell casings as they sifted through the sand from the crime scene. So, the victims had been shot...executed by a bullet to the brain. Maybe that's why the skulls were missing.

"Detective Eames," Elizabeth Rodgers said as she sauntered down the hall. "Why are you cluttering up my hall?"

Eames waved her cell phone. "I was on the phone."

"Uhm..." Rodgers stopped in front of the door to the autopsy suite, her hand poised to push open the door. "Have a look at this..."

Alex stepped up beside her and peered in the small window. Goren was moving from gurney to gurney while Westfall watched. Whether it was conscious on his part or not, he seemed to staying awfully close to the petite woman.

"What's her story," Eames asked as she watched the show.

"I've known Laura for fifteen years." Rodgers shrugged. ""She's a nomad. She hasn't lived in one place for more than a year or two but she's the best in the business."

Eames watched the pair through the window. The small women looked like she was fading fast, and Goren looked like he was just getting up to speed. "So, what's she doing here then?"

"She's tired of travelling, of the politics. She's the best. We were lucky to get her." Rodgers turned back to the window. "She's rather like your partner. Brilliant, driven, and completely dedicated to the job to the detriment of her personal life."

"Don't tell me there's two of them," Eames groaned.

"Isn't that scary," Rodgers grinned. Goren and Westfall were doing some weird dance between the tables. She looked annoyed and said something to him. Goren skittered back liked he'd been shot. "Wonder what that was about?"

"I'd better get in there." Eames paused just before she opened the door. "She's single right? Hasn't got a husband hidden in another country?"

"Oh, she's single all right." Rodgers started to walk away but she paused and turned back. "I can't believe I'm about to say this," she said frowning and pointed at the door, "But those two are made for each other."

* * *

I hadn't pulled an all-nighter in years and I had one of those low-thumping overtired headaches developing. I could function with the pain of broken bones and pulled muscles, but give me a headache and I get cranky. And on top of that, Goren kept making impertinent statements and asking questions.

This weird dance we were doing was seriously annoying. He seemed to have no concept of personal space. Every step he took brought him so close that I could smell his cologne. Don't get me wrong, it was nice stuff, and if we'd been in the local watering hole...well, no one had ever accused me of being shy. Then I looked up into those deep, dark eyes. His lashes were so long they really didn't belong on a guy. I've never had the desire to go swimming in dark chocolate, but suddenly it seemed like a pretty good idea.

I don't know where the next words out of my mouth came from, and in hindsight it probably wasn't the most politic thing to say, but then no one has ever accused me of being a diplomat either.

"Look Detective," I hissed, "If you want to get any closer you'll have to take off your pants."

He stepped back like I'd zapped him with a cattle prod. I tried to look suitably annoyed, I really did, but I just barely managed not to burst out laughing at his surprised expression. He stood there, wide eyed, and blinking rapidly. As he recovered, rather quickly I thought, his blink rate dropped to normal and one eyebrow slowly raised. The tiniest hint of a smile played across his lips. "Shall I bring flowers next time? Maybe a...a bottle of wine?"

"You must think I'm a cheap date."

"That's not what I'm thinking," he smirked.

God help me, I giggled. "Sorry, I'm a little tired."

Eames rescued me from shoving my foot further in my mouth when she stuck her head back in the door, "Hey, we've got to go," she called.

"Right," Goren collected his portfolio from the counter. He paused at the door and turned back to me. "Thanks Professor," he smiled crookedly. "I'll be in touch."

* * *

"Earth to Bobby..." Eames repeated and when she didn't get a response, she poked him in the side.

"Ouch," he turned in his seat and glared at her. "What did you do that for?"

"I'm tired of talking to myself, Maryann," she snapped at him. "Now get your mind off The Professor and back to business."

"Eames..." his voice was low and menacing.

"Ooh, like I'm scared." She risked taking her eyes off the road, and turned to look at him.

She could see the guilty tinge of pink around his ears. Nailed that one.

"What did you want to tell me?" he asked quietly.

"The lab found two shell casings, 9mm, after they sifted through all that sand. They're running them through the database now. Our victims were shot in the head and that's why the skulls are missing."

"They retrieved the other shells but lost those two in the sand. That suggests that the 'tomb' was constructed ahead of time." Goren scribble notes in his portfolio. "This was planned. Maybe we can get a line on where the building materials came from, or who ordered them."

"I guess you can't put a load of bricks in the back of the family van. Someone had to deliver them," Eames added. "And the lab also found a business card. It's not readable, so they're trying to bring up a name. That should give us another angle."

"Maybe between that, Immigration, and the facial reconstruction we'll be able to identify these people," Goren mused.

"Right," Eames remarked wryly. "And pigs will fly."

They rode in silence for a few minutes. Eames fought traffic, and Goren stared out the side window.

Out of the blue Eames said, "She seems nice."

"Who?" Goren asked absently.

"The Professor."

Goren nervously slid his eyes in her direction. She was up to something. She was being far too casual. "Uh huh."

"Elizabeth says she's single."

"You talked to Rodgers about her," he said warily.

"I met her in the hall and it came up in conversation," she shrugged. "Maybe you should ask her out," Eames declared.

"Eames!"

"Oh, for Christ's sake, Bobby." She drove with one hand, and waved the other in his direction. "Get a goddamn personal life, would you! When was the last time you had a date?"

"None of your business." He thought back to the tall, leggy brunette that he had taken out to dinner. And, not too many days later his mother was diagnosed with lymphoma. He hadn't seen her since. Had to be a year and a half ago, probably longer.

"I'm too busy right now," he muttered. "And, she's not my type."

Eames snorted. "She's attractive, well-travelled, an intellectual, and...breathing. What more do you want?"

"Eames," he said firmly. "Leave it...alone!"

"Alright, alright," she said soothingly. "I'll shut up." She was encouraged by his sudden display of irritation. Not only did it mean that the old Bobby wasn't totally lost, it also meant that the notion of asking Westfall out had occurred to him too.

Five minutes later Eames began to hum quietly. Bobby collapsed against the back of the seat and stared out the side window. He was sure she was humming the theme to 'Gilligan's Island'. This was going to be a long...long day.

* * *

They appeared at Sydney Robertson's office at the scheduled time, and were kept waiting for another hour before they actually talked to him. Eames found him to be as overbearing as she suspected. His company had only owned the property for two years. They had never had any structural inspections completed on the building because they had always intended to demolish it to make way for condominiums. The only upside to the interview, now that they had basically cleared him and his company of involvement in the murders, was that now the deputy mayor would leave them alone.

Following the interview, they stopped at the forensics lab.

"Hi Bill. What have you got for us?" Alex asked as she walked up to the technician. Goren had already pulled on latex gloves, and was busy inspecting everything laid out on the table.

"We've got a photo of that business card for you." Bill Watson deftly manoeuvred himself between Goren and the evidence until Goren, mouth twisted in annoyance, folded his arms and leaned against the adjacent counter. "It's from John Doe One, the white male. It was in his rear pant's pocket."

"Did you get a name?" Eames asked excitedly. Their chances of solving this crime were climbing.

"It's pretty badly degraded," Watson laid a plastic envelope on the table in front of her. Inside was a business card-sized square of blurry cardstock. And, then he slapped down a photo of the item that had been taken while under ultraviolet light. "It's from a law firm...Cooper and Fine. . Still can't make out who the card belongs to, but it's a place to start."

Goren looked at the photo. The law firm's name was clearly visible, but the rest of the card was a mess of distorted ink smears. "Doesn't necessarily mean it's his card. Someone could have given it to him." He recalled the card he had give to Laura Westfall. She had slipped it into the back pocket of her jeans.

Watson grinned. "Yeah, but we found it in this." And with a dramatic flourish he slapped another plastic bag on the table. It contained a tattered leather card case. "I don't know about you, but the only cards in my case are my own."

"Show off," Eames muttered in mock annoyance.

"Is that it?" Goren asked and there was nothing mock about his annoyance.

"Ballistics is still running the shell casings. We've got some more bone fragments that we've sent over to the ME's office and a few scraps of cloth, but we're still sifting through all the sand and cataloguing the rest of the debris. That'll take a couple of more days." Watson gathered up the evidence bags. "I'll call you when we have something."


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Who me?

Author's Note: As before. Thanks to my reviewers and those of you who have me on their alerts. I appreciate all your kind words and encouragement.

Chapter 3 - Late on Day 2

Goren hovered over Eames' shoulder while she did a search to see if the law firm of Cooper and Fine came up in the police database.

"Here." She pointed at the screen. "Wanda Preston, the office manager, reported one of their paralegals, George Marsten, missing in April of 2004. Marsten was a former cop in Buffalo. Moved here in 2002 after he retired and started working with the firm. An ex-wife in Rochester, but no kids."

"I'll call Buffalo PD," Goren walked around to his own chair. "See if they've got any medical records they can send us."

"I'll call the lawyers," Eames picked up her receiver and started dialling.

* * *

"Okay people that's it." I glanced at the clock over my shoulder. Time to release the hounds. "Any questions?" I perched on the corner of the desk at the front of the lecture hall and watched students scramble to stuff notebooks, and the occasional computer into their backpacks, briefcases and totes. No one said a thing, at least not to me.

"Alright, I'll see you next week." I began to collect my own belongings and thanked my lucky stars that I only had the one course today. I could have given any of the lectures on the 'Introduction to Anthropology' in my sleep, which was pretty close to my present state. Elizabeth had chased me out of the morgue at noon, so I had gone home, grabbed a forty minute nap and then was back at the University in time for my afternoon lecture.

I followed the last of the students out of the hall and into the corridor. I dodged the taller and younger, and headed to the physical anthropology lab in the basement. I did have an office, above ground, with a view of the strip of grass between this building and the next, but I spent most of my time in the basement lab. As I marched along the basement corridor, a young male voice sang out from one of the grad student offices. "Hey Laura!"

I stopped and turned. Peter Ellis had his blonde head sticking out into the hall. "It's ready." I followed the wild blonde hair back into his office. Peter was a graduate student, and one of the brighter ones at that. He was a big, good-looking kid that looked like he should be playing football not playing around on the computer. If his interest in Anthropology hadn't been nurtured as undergraduate, I'm sure he would've been hacking into government databases instead.

"Let see it," I hovered over his shoulder and waited for the magic to appear on the screen as he worked the keyboard. First, the data points he had measured on the skull appeared, then the skull itself, then an overlay of muscle, and finally the face. "He looks like Michael," I said. Of course, I meant when he was still singing with his brothers and before all the plastic surgery and the skin lightening, or vitiligo, or whatever it was. He'd been a cute kid.

"Who?" Pete asked.

I sighed quietly. Some days these kids made me feel really...really old.

"That looks really good." As I watched the picture morphed slightly, and now he had close cropped hair. It morphed again and he sported dreadlocks. And, again and a full blown afro. "Can you burn a couple of disks for me?"

"Yep," Peter pawed through an assortment of DVDs on his desk, searching for writeable ones. "I'll have them in a minute."

"Make sure you date and sign everything and I'll be back." I hurried out of his office and down the hall. I unlocked the door to my lab and dropped my lecture notes on the desk. I fished around in my tote bag until I found my phone, scrolled through the directory for the number and hit dial.

When a voice finally answered I said, "Detective Goren, please."

* * *

Eames stretched and glanced at the clock. Almost quitting time. They had lined up a morning appointment with the office manager at Cooper and Fine. They had a possible ID on the white male and were waiting on the medical records from Boston to confirm it. And, Immigration was running a check of its files to see if it could match up the other four victims. All in all, it had shaped up to be a pretty good day. And, judging by the way Goren was whispering into his phone there was more news.

"Who was that?" Eames asked when he hung up the receiver.

"Professor Westfall."

"Oh...really."

Goren grimaced at her. "She's on her way over with the facial reconstruction."

"What," Eames blinked innocently at him. "She doesn't do email?"

"She's got to return the skull to the ME's office," he said peevishly. "Its on the way."

"Oh," Eames pulled a file from the stack on her desk and began to peruse the contents. "On the way to where?" she muttered just loud enough that Goren could hear if he chose to.

With an exaggerated sigh and sending her a piercing look across the desk that separated them, he rose from his chair and lumbered across the squad.

"Eames," Ross' voice came from behind her. "What was that about?"

She swivelled in her chair to face him. "Oh, nothing really. I'm just having some fun with him."

"Is that wise?" Ross shoved his hands in his pockets. "The man's only been back for a month."

"Well after the hell he put us through," she grinned evilly, "payback is warranted."

Ross raised one eyebrow and sighed. "Just remember if you poke a bear with a stick it usually bites back."

"Don't worry," she looked across the squad but couldn't see him. "I think I've made my point."

"Are you going to tell me what the point is?"

"No sir," she said. Then in a pique of devilishness she asked, "How's Dr. Rodgers?"

Ross opened his mouth to snap a reply, thought better of it, and closed it again. After staring at her for a few seconds he said, "Go home and start fresh in the morning. I think you could use the sleep."

"Gee thanks, Captain." she smiled at him.

Ross grunted at her and then wandered back to his office. Eames began to tidy up her desk then she saw Goren heading towards her.

"Captain says to go home." Eames shuffled the final few pages back into their respective folders. "I'm going to take off."

"Okay," Goren answered quietly. He was going to wait for Professor Westfall to arrive with the reconstruction but he was leery of saying anything for fear of setting off another round of teasing. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Don't stay all night," she ordered. Eames gathered her purse from her desk drawer and picked up her coat. Only after she disappeared onto the elevator did Goren breathe a sigh of relief.

He gathered up his paperwork and moved into the conference room. He had photos of each skeleton pinned to a bulletin board. Beneath each he had an index card summarizing the findings of each autopsy. On another board, he had pinned photos of the crime scene and written highlights from the forensics examination. On a white board, he was beginning to develop a psychological profile of the murders. He read through the files on the table, made notes in his portfolio and then transferred the highlights to the board. He kept at it until one of the detectives working the night shift stepped into the room.

"Goren, this fax is for you ." He dropped a sheaf of papers on the table. "And, there's a Professor Westfield on the way up."

"Thanks," Goren picked up the fax and began reading. "It's Westfall, not Westfield."

"Whatever. I'll send him your way."

"Her...it's a woman," he corrected absently. The fax from the Buffalo PD contained the medical records for George Marsten. Bobby was flipping through the pages when he heard the click of high heels on the floor followed by a polite knock. He looked up and then stood.

"Hello Detective," she said. She was wearing a slim, knee length skirt and carried a tote bag and a dark coat over one arm. A pair of tortoise shell glasses were tucked in the V of her blue silk blouse.

"Uhm...hi." he said. Suddenly conscious that he was staring, he flapped the pages he held in his hand. "These are medical records...you should look at these."

"Okay." She dropped her coat and bag on the closest chair, and took the pages from his hand. She glanced at them briefly and then began to paw through her bag. "What did I do with those glasses?"

"They're..." he waved one finger at her, "In your shirt."

"Oh right," She slid them on her nose and began reading through the sheaf of pages while Goren paced, back and forth, in front of the boards.

"Well," he asked when she finished the last page. "Is it him?"

"I'd need to see the x-rays to be a hundred percent. The description of the injuries are a match, so I think so." She stood in front of one of the boards and placed her finger on one of the photos. "That's George Marsten."

"Good. Now we're getting somewhere."

She handed the paper work back to him. "How did you come to find these?"

"The lab found a business card in his clothing." Goren scribbled Marsten's name on an index card and pinned it beneath the photo of his remains. "His employer reported him missing in 2004. We'll be talking to them in the morning."

"See that's the stuff I never get to hear about," she said. "What else have you found out?"

"The lab found two shell casings in the sand." Goren leaned around her to point at a photo. "They're still looking to see if they can find a match."

"Uhm..." Westfall hopped up on the end of the table and observed the boards over the top of her glasses. Her legs swung back and forth like a little kid's. "The lab sent me some more bone fragments to look at. I don't expect there'll be anything definitive. I've got classes all day tomorrow, so I won't get to them until Saturday."

"Well you did get the preliminary results and the facial reconstruction done in record time," he mused. "I think we can wait on the fragments."

"Good," she nodded. "Cause I sure would like to see a bed soon."

Goren rubbed the back of his neck and stared at the floor. Me too, he thought...with you in it. Damndamndamn.

"Can I have a copy of those records?" she asked. "I'll see if I can get those x-rays."

"Sure. Just give me a second." Goren escaped from the room and strode to the copier. Damn that Eames, he thought, as he punched buttons on the machine. Now that she'd put the thought in his head, all he could think about was Laura Westfall.

Innuendo much, she thought to herself as she watched him through the glass wall as he waited for the photocopier to spit out the necessary pages. The jacket and tie he had worn at the morgue that morning had gone missing and the top button of his shirt was open. Get a grip on yourself woman, don't be an idiot, you don't even know him. "I will behave," she mumbled to herself. "I will...I will."

"Sorry did you say something?" He suddenly appeared beside her with the copies in his extended hand.

"Just mumbling to myself." She took the papers from his outstretched hand and slid them into her bag and pulled out a DVD. "Here's your reconstruction."

"Thanks." Goren took the disk from her and smiled. The grin faded and a thoughtful expression crossed his face.

"What?" She asked and put a hand to her face. "Have a got ink or something on me?"

"No," he tilted his head to one side. "Your eyes are blue. I could've sworn they were green."

"Oh that." Oh jeez, she was starting to like his impertinent remarks. "They change colour. I wear blue, they're blue; I wear green, they're green."

"Oh," he nodded and thought, I've got to get a better look at those eyes.

"We can look at this next door." He pointed over his shoulder with the disk. As he guided her through the door to the media room, his hand hovered at the small of her back, close to but not quite touching. The room was crowded with huge flat screen monitors and several computer stations. He held the chair for her as she sat and then he pulled another chair next to it. He settled himself and then loaded the disk into the player. In seconds, the photo of young John Doe Four appeared on the screen, followed by other versions with different hair treatments. "Doesn't he looks like...?"

"Yeah," Laura peered at the screen over the tops of her glasses. "I said the same thing to my grad student and he had no clue who I was talking about."

"They keep getting younger and we get older." He froze realizing what he'd just implied. "Sorry...I didn't mean..."

She started laughing. "Don't worry about it. At least most of your youngsters have made it through puberty." She patted his arm sympathetically. "Besides it's amazing what you can do with hair dye and makeup."

He turned his head to look at her. God, she was frank. "Do you keep any secrets?"

"Oh, I can keep a secret. I just don't feel the need to keep any of my own," she said. "What do you want to know?"

"I'm afraid to ask. You might tell me."

"I'm forty-two. Never been married or pregnant, but I bet you already know that." She tapped his arm again.

"Actually I didn't get that far. I was too busy reading your research papers," Goren said. "You're...prolific."

"A girl's got to produce to play with the big boys." Inwardly, she cringed. She was doing it again. That was almost as bad as the crack about his pants. She used to have an off switch. She wondered what happened to it.

He coughed slightly and fiddled with the keyboard to cover the fact that he'd almost swallowed his tongue. Playing with the big boys, indeed.

"Let see," she continued. "I can't see more than a foot without contacts and still need glasses to read." She waved the offending articles in front of her and then tucked one arm back into the 'V' at the front of her blouse. "I drive too fast. Can't sing worth a damn, but do it anyway. Read 'Lord of the Rings' every Christmas. I like dark chocolate, dark beer, white wine and cocktails should contain rum. I have to drink unleaded coffee otherwise they can feel me vibrating in Jersey. Oh, and years ago...I inhaled."

He noticed that her hand still rested on his the arm. A broad square palm with short fingers tipped with plain, unpainted nails. She probably didn't play piano either, he thought.

"Did I forget anything?" she asked.

He looked her up and down and his eyes fastened on the black peep toe pumps. One leg was crossed over the other and the pump dangled from a bouncing foot.

"Yeah," he said. "What's with the cowboy boots?"

"Western heritage," she said with a grin. "My dad was an honest-to-god cowboy." She uncrossed her legs and rested her elbows on her knees. The weight of her glasses pulled the front of her blouse askew revealing the curve of her breast and a hint of ivory lace. "I used to rodeo in high school. I was State Reserve Champion in barrel racing and I have the belt buckle to prove it."

"Rodeo," he forced his eyes away from the open shirt and back to her face. "You're kidding, right?"

"Nope," she shook her head. "You can look it up."

"I will," he smirked.

She pointed a finger at him. "Okay, your turn." She swivelled her chair so that she faced him and crossed her arms which fixed the gaping shirt. Her knees brushed against his thigh.

He blinked. Shit. "Forty-six. No marriages, no kids. Eyesight is fine. Knee bothers me occasionally. I don't get to drive. Don't sing...usually. I don't read a lot of fiction anymore, no time. Pastrami on rye which I probably shouldn't eat anyway. German beer, Glenlivet, and any good wine. Real coffee. And...no comment."

"Why don't you drive?" She was frowning, puzzled.

"I said I don't _get_ to drive," he corrected her. "Eames likes to drive, so I let her drive."

"That's good to know."

"What is? That Eames likes to drive?"

"No," she answered with a small smile. "That you're willing to accommodate your partner's little quirks."

"Well, she's put up with enough of my...quirks through the years," he said wryly. "It's the least I could do."

"What'd you do to your knee?"

"Just an old injury," he said quietly and rubbed the offending joint. "Got banged up a bit when I was in the Army."

"MP?"

"And CID." He tilted his head to watch her. "How'd you know?"

"Seemed logical," she shrugged. "To have the guy with brains investigating the ones that forgot where they left theirs."

He snorted. "Some days it was a close call."

"So what happens now?" she asked.

"We'll send your reconstruction over to INS. It might help them narrow down the search." He removed the disk from the computer and placed it back in its case. "And we'll send it out to the precincts and to the schools. Maybe someone will recognize him."

"What about checking with survivor groups?" she mused. "I know there are a couple of support groups for survivors of torture in the City. Someone might know John Doe Three."

He smiled indulgently at her. "We sent out a query to them this afternoon and to all the area hospitals just in case he sought treatment for that injured arm."

"Well in that case," she rose from the chair. "I'll get out of your hair. I'm sure you'd like to get home."

Goren glanced at the clock. It was getting late. "I'll walk out with you. Just give me a minute to tidy up."

"Okay." She returned to the other room to pick up her coat and bag. In a matter of minutes, Goren was standing in the doorway wearing his suit jacket. "Ready?"

"Always," he answered.

She closed one eye and peered at him through the other. "Were you a boy scout, too?"

"No." He followed her to the elevator, one hand hovering at her back, close but not touching. As the elevator doors slid closed he asked, "Have you had dinner?"


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: They all belong to Dick Wolf, except Laura.

Author's Note: Thank you to the usual suspects. You guys rock!

Chapter 4 - Day Two - Evening

"Have you had dinner?" he asked. His sleeve brushed my arm as he punched a button on the panel.

I tilted my head up...and up so that I could see his face. That was a smooth move on his part, waiting until I was trapped in this tiny little elevator. "No, actually I haven't."

"I know this little Italian place not too far from here." He nearly bent himself in half and whispered close to my ear. "They have the best manicotti in the City."

"Really," I mused. "So would this constitute a date?"

He raised one eyebrow at me and rubbed one hand over his twitching lips. "Well, we've already had most of the conversation for a first date, we might as well have the meal that goes with it."

"You're on," I nodded. "But no shop talk. I think we can find something more interesting to talk about than our work."

"Oh," he said softly. "I'm sure we can."

I had a date. The sixteen year old girl, who lives in my head, was gleefully jumping up and down, and I'm fairly certain that, somewhere, a choir of angels was singing under the joyful direction of Grandma Westfall. She always was an incurable romantic. The elevator doors chose that moment to slide open making more flirtatious banter impossible unless we wanted half a dozen uniformed officers, assorted clerks, perps, civilians and a couple of detectives overhearing our conversation.

It was a clear night, but still a little on the nippy side. As we strolled up the street, he impressed me right off the bat by shortening his stride so that I didn't have to jog to keep up. I suppose he was use to it given that Eames was only slightly taller than I was. There was none of the crowding that I had seen earlier in the day. Although, every time we crossed a street, or had to manoeuver around pedestrians or an obstruction in the sidewalk, I could feel his hand on the small of my back. It was gentlemanly, and not at all intrusive. I would've liked it even better if I had actually been able to feel the warmth of his hand through my coat.

When we arrived at the restaurant only three other tables were occupied. He greeted the owner in Italian and spent a few minutes conversing. The owner, who had more in common with Sophia Loren than the stereotypical grey-haired and black-clad Signora you would expect to find running a restaurant, was obviously a fan of Investigatore Goren. He introduced me as Professore Westfall.

"Buona sera, Signora," I said and shook her hand. Goren had the good grace not to express surprise as I continued speaking in Italian, although one eyebrow crept higher. After a minute of exchanging pleasantries she escorted us to a table in the back away from the other diners. She obviously thought this was a romantic night out for us. I was interested to see where it was going myself. She left us with menus and then disappeared into the kitchen.

"So you speak Italian."

I just smiled in response and rested my arms on the table. "Didn't you get to the papers in the foreign journals?"

"I read the English translations," he said. "So exactly how many languages do you speak?"

"Besides Italian, I'm fluent in Spanish and French, and I can carry a conversation in Croatian, Arabic and Swahili. You?"

"German, Italian and Spanish, some Korean and Mandarin, and a little bit of Japanese, Arabic, Thai and a couple of others."

"I guess your pick-up lines would work in any bar on the planet," I teased.

He snorted in reply as he opened his menu. "I know..uhm...'get lost' in 14 different languages."

"I doubt it's that bad," I said incredulously.

"Well...maybe not." He smiled and tapped one finger on his open menu. "What would you like?" he asked.

"You choose," I answered. I had left the menu on the table, mainly because I had no idea where I had put my glasses so I couldn't see it anyway.

He looked up from the menu and a small smile spread across his face. "They're in your blouse...again."

I looked down. The glasses had pulled a button free and were hanging one button lower than usual, so he was getting a good view of my cleavage. I was glad I was wearing one of the 'fancy' bras, and not one of the sport bras I wore when I was mucking about in the dirt. "You spend an inordinate amount of time staring at my wares."

"Then stop flaunting them."

All I could see over the top of the menu was his eyes. They were incredibly bright even in the dim light of our intimate corner. He was enjoying himself immensely.

"You, sir, are a flirt."

He dropped the menu to the table with a slap. "Pot calling the kettle black." He levelled one long finger at me. "You started it as I recall."

"I claim self defence. You were invading my airspace." I pointed right back at him.

"I didn't realize I had to file a flight plan."

The waiter chose that moment to appear with an open bottle of red wine. "Compliments of the Signora," he murmured as he poured two glasses and placed the bottle on the table. "Are you ready to order?"

"We'll have the manicotti," Goren answered. His eyes flicked from the bottle of wine, to me, to the end of the table. He was definitely up to something but he waited until after the waiter had disappeared.

"Well this is fortuitous," Bobby raised one eyebrow, and his mouth twitched in repressed laughter as he looked at me across the table. "A bottle of wine." His hand reached out to the vase of fancy tulips at the end of the table and placed them in front of me. "And, flowers."

Oh, my he was good...really, really good. I stopped breathing and my mind went in a rather embarrassing direction. I had a mental picture of him in the autopsy suite that morning, blue suit jacket, white shirt, two tone blue tie and...no pants. Boxers or briefs, I wondered. I was either having a hot flash or someone had turned the heat up. His eyes gleamed mischievously. I wondered what he was thinking.

"I guess that makes you...the floor show." I hope he didn't hear the catch in my voice.

"Sorry," he leaned across the table and whispered back. "I only do private parties."

The temperature climbed higher. I resisted the urge to flap my hands in front of my face. I don't know what pheromones he was throwing at me across the table, but they were definitely working. And, then he cocked one eyebrow at me.

I blinked. "Uncle," I said in surrender.

He grinned in triumph. "I'd rather you call me Bobby."

Damn. I probably gave up too easily but it would've gotten me into trouble. Oh, but it would have been glorious fun.

"Bobby, it is."

We stopped flirting and just started talking. He was a wonderful companion, bright, easy to talk to. He seemed like he was having a good time and I know I was. We talked about the state of the world, the upcoming election, the effect of global warming on polar bears, and the price of crude oil. We compared the places we'd travelled to. We had managed to be in the same countries at different times: Germany, France, Italy, Britain, but while he'd spent considerable time in Asia, where I had never been, I had spent more time in Africa, where he hadn't been.

I told him about standing on the edge of a river on my first trip to Africa watching the hippos cavorting in the water and having our guide pull me back from the edge just as a huge crocodile heaved himself up on to the bank. He told me about watching some army buddies in Korea trying to sample a local dish consisting of a live octopus that insisted on crawling up their noses.

By the time we finally left the restaurant, it was dark. Exactly twenty-four hours had passed since we first laid eyes on each other. I don't know if it was the lack of sleep, the sexual attraction, or the scent of his cologne, but things seemed to be moving along at lightening speed.

As he walked me back to 1PP, so that I could collect my truck, I clung to his arm. I hadn't had all that much to drink, but if we were going to be on a first name basis I felt I was entitled to take his arm and he really didn't seem to mind. The whole way I debated in my head if I should offer him a ride home. I knew if I he got in the confined space of my truck, I probably wouldn't let him out. I tried to repress the giggle that escaped as I pictured little ol' me trying to wrestle Robert Goren to the ground.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing really," I lied. "We managed to get through the whole evening and didn't talk about work. I can't remember the last time that happened. I had a good time."

"Me too," he said.

He held the door as I climbed into my truck and waited until I turned the engine over. The CD player kicked in and Carlos Santana played 'Samba Pa Ti' at a volume that was slightly higher than necessary. I fiddled with the knob until the sexy guitar played softly in the background. It added to the charged atmosphere. I wondered what it would be like to dance with him, his body moving in rhythm with mine.

"Can I drop you somewhere?" I asked. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead. Admiral Farragut was a brilliant man, even if that's not exactly what he said.

He had one arm draped over the roof as he leaned in the open door. "Oh, I think I'd better walk," he said. His voice had taken on a husky tone that I hadn't heard before. He gently closed the door trapping me in my own vehicle.

I pressed the window control, and when the glass disappeared I rested my arm on the door. "Are you scared of me, Robert?"

One eyebrow crept upward at the absurdity of the question and his lips curled into a smile. "You are the most...extraordinary woman."

"So what are you waiting for?"

He laughed. "Third date," he finally said.

"Standards. I like that in a man." I grinned at him and then shrugged. "But, you may have to do some fancy talking to get a second date after laughing at me."

"I will call you Saturday." Every word of that promise was pronounced with precision. He settled his hand over mine and squeezed, his thumb slowly stroked the back of my hand.

"You just want me for my mind," I teased. "To finish up that bone analysis."

"That too." His eyes caught mine, and with a final pat he released my hand. "Go home. Get some sleep."

Right. Like that was gonna happen. I smiled at him and when he stepped back from the truck, I put it in gear. As I pulled out of the garage I caught a glimpse of him in the rearview mirror, hands shoved into his pockets, his long legs carrying him up the ramp behind me. Damn, I love New York. I'd had more fun in the past 24 hours than I'd had in years. I just hoped to God I didn't do something stupid and screw it up.

Author's Note: I know what you were thinking. Be patient, we'll get there.


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer - Except for the originals, they all belong to Mr. Wolf.

Author's Note - Thanks for hanging in guys.

* * *

Chapter Five - Day Three

When Eames arrived at the office the next morning, she found Goren already reading through Missing Persons' file on George Marsten.

"Morning Bobby."

"Eames," he looked up, smiled and then returned to the file.

She studied him while she settled at her desk. Wonder of wonders, he had shaved off the scruffy beard, and what she thought of as 'his signature look' was back; dark blue suit, mid-blue shirt and two-tone tie. He looked good, rested even. She wondered what he'd been up to the night before, and she wondered what part Laura Westfall had played in it.

"So where are we?"

He closed the file he was reading, and began to search his desk for the file holding the pictures he'd printed of the facial reconstruction. "The medical report came from Buffalo PD, and Professor Westfall says the injuries are a match, but she's wants to have a look at the old x-rays before she confirms his identity. And, she brought the reconstruction..."

He finally located the file, flipped it open and handed it to her. "I've already sent copies to INS, the school district and the local precincts, and Missing Persons. Oh, and I've got Forensics looking at the evidence Missing Persons collected from Marsten's office and apartment."

"Did you actually go home last night?" She regarded him through narrowed eyes. Judging by the amount of work he'd already done he wouldn't have had the time to do anything with the Professor except say hello, thank you and good-bye.

"Yes," he rolled his eyes at her. "I...had dinner and then I went home."

"Oh," she said. She almost asked if he'd gone home alone, but changed her mind. There are there are some things a partner's better off not knowing.

If only Eames knew what she'd started, Goren thought. Her prodding had prompted the impulsive dinner invitation and the evening had turned into a unqualified success. The flirting and resulting sexual tension had been palpable. He realized how much he missed that energy in his life. Laura Westfall was so open and honest, that she was constantly throwing him off balance. He didn't quite know what to do with someone who didn't need to be 'read' and maybe that was why he was so inexplicably drawn to her. She was an intelligent beautiful woman who found him attractive and made no attempt to hide the fact. That, in and of itself, he found fascinating, and truth be told, he was a little scared of her. That might also explain why he'd walked home instead of taking the offered ride. He instinctively knew that if he got in her vehicle his life would take a dramatic turn, and he wasn't sure if he was ready yet.

* * *

Later that morning, Detectives Goren and Eames cooled their heels in the threadbare conference room of Cooper and Fine while they waited for the office manager to join them. Cooper and Fine had either hit hard times and couldn't afford to redecorate, or they put all their funds into the people they serviced. Goren studied the bookshelves, running one long finger over the spines of the leather-clad law books.

Eames sat at the long scarred conference table, keeping one eye on her partner and the other on the door. Goren was in such an uncharacteristically cheerful mood that she had briefly wondered what drugs he was on. His mood over the past month had been almost permanently stuck in neutral, with brief swings into petulance and annoyance. It was hard to believe that in twenty-four hours, Laura Westfall had wrought such a dramatic change that 'fun Bobby' had reappeared without chemical assistance.

The door quietly opened and a tall, rangy woman in a elegant, if slightly out-of-date, pant suit entered the room carrying a stack of files. She dropped them on the table with a thud. "I'm Wanda Preston."

Eames rose smoothly from her chair. "I'm Detective Eames and this is Detective Goren."

Goren turned his back to the bookcase and studied the older woman.

"Well," she remarked. "So you've finally found Mr. Marsten?"

"Well, its not official yet." Eames answered. "But we believe it could be him."

"But I thought that's why..." She looked from Eames to Goren.

"We found your firm's business card in the victim's pocket," Goren said vaguely. He stepped closer to the older woman. "But he could have given it to someone."

"I see," Preston raised one eyebrow. "So, how can I help you then?"

"Tell us about Mr. Marsten," Eames said. "What kind of work did he do for you?"

"George worked part-time as a paralegal. He did a lot of work with refugee claimants; initial interviews, background research, preparing documents, and some investigative work."

Goren scribbled notes in his portfolio.

"Anything controversial?" Eames asked.

"I wouldn't think so," Ms Preston shook her head.

"What was he like?" Goren asked.

"George was...dedicated. The first one in and the last to leave. Kept to himself mostly. But you should talk to Sandra Fisher, our receptionist, she and George got along quite well."

"They were romantically involved?" Goren asked.

"Maybe," Preston shrugged. "But I got the impression they were just friends."

"Is she here today?" Eames asked.

"I'll send her in." Preston stood, gathered her file folders and then headed for the door.

"Ms. Preston," Goren's voice caught her with her hand on the doorknob. "Did Mr. Marsten have any contact with refugee claimants from Central Africa? Maybe Rwanda or Somalia?"

She paused at the door and turned back. "Sorry," she shrugged. "I don't have much contact with the clients but Sandra would know."

"Okay, thanks." Goren returned to scribbling in his portfolio, Ms. Preston was already forgotten.

"What'd you think?" Eames asked as she watched him writing.

"She doesn't know much...for an office manager." Goren mumbled. "Or she's not saying."

"Well, if you want to know what's going on in the average office, you talk to the secretaries not the management."

There was a polite knock on the door, and then it opened. Sandra Fisher was a plump fifty-something woman in a slightly too-tight dress and a shock of bottle blonde hair.

"You wanted to see me Detectives." She dropped into a chair, and crossed her arms on the table. "Prissie says you want to know about George."

Eames wondered if Ms. Preston knew what the office staff called her. "You knew him well?"

"Better than most of the people here." She shrugged her shoulders. "My husband died last year and George was only recently divorced. We dated a little. Nothing serious. Sort of getting our feet wet again."

"Did he have any problems? Gambling? Drugs or alcohol?" Eames asked.

"No," she snorted. "He liked a drink, but I didn't see any evidence that it went too far."

"What about enemies?" Goren asked. "Did he have any issues with anyone?"

"He was a beat cop for twenty-five years, I'm sure he pissed off someone, but I doubt a perp would come all this way to even the score over a minor beef. He still talked to his ex, for gods sake."

Goren tilted his head, studying her. He found her use of language interesting. "Your husband...he was a cop?"

She nodded. "Nearly thirty years. He didn't know what to do with himself after he retired and then his heart quit."

Eames glanced at Goren. It sounded like him, all job, and no life. His track record over the past two years didn't bode well for his future. If he wasn't careful, she thought, he could be destined for the same fate.

"Did George ever work with refugees from Africa?" Goren asked, changing tack.

"Sometimes." Fisher was thoughtful. "You looking for anyone in particular?"

Goren opened his portfolio and handed her a picture of young Johnny Doe. She studied it thoughtfully.

"He's not familiar." She shook her head. "How old is he?"

"About twelve."

"No, I don't recognize him." She handed it back. "But then most people don't bring their kids with them."

"How about a black man, mid-thirties to early forties, missing his left hand?" Eames asked.

"Now, that does ring a bell," Fisher chewed on her thumbnail. "I think he was one of the first people George interviewed after he started working here. He was only here once, maybe twice. I don't remember his name..."

"Could you find his file, do you think?" Goren asked and glanced at Eames.

"I don't know if we actually took him on as a client, but I'll see what I can find for you. It might take a day or two."

"Whatever you can find would be helpful." Eames handed her a business card.

"I come in on the weekends to do the books, and Miss Priss won't be here, so I'll look then," she said conspiratorially. "If I find anything I'll call you on Monday."

"Thank you, Mrs. Fisher," Goren said. "You've been helpful."

"I hope you catch them, Detectives," she said. "I miss George. He was a nice guy...for an ex-cop."

"I'm sorry...them?"

She snorted at them. "Last time I heard, Major Case didn't investigate Missing Persons and I don't think George was kidnapped. He was murdered, and he's come to the attention of somebody important, otherwise you wouldn't be here."

After she left the room, Eames turned to Goren. "Maybe the Department should be hiring her."

* * *

When they walked back into the squad, Ross waved at them from his office. "Where are we?" he asked when they crossed his threshold.

Eames sat in a chair in front of Ross' desk. Goren hovered behind her, as far from Ross as the space would allow.

"We talked to the mayor's brother-in-law. They've only owned the property for two years, never did any inspections because they always intended to rip it down. We've basically cleared them."

"That's something." Ross sighed. "What else?"

"You saw the autopsy report?" When he nodded, Eames continued. "We've got a tentative ID on one of the bodies, George Marsten. He's retired from Buffalo PD. We've also sent info to INS to see if they can match the others. We contacted the local hospitals and survivor support groups to see if they know the fellow with the missing arm."

"An ex-cop." Ross frowned. "When were you planning on telling me this?"

"We only got his medical report last night." Eames added. "He worked part-time for a law office. We talked to the office manager and the receptionist and they're co-operating, but we might need a warrant to get the files Marsten worked on."

"What's Westfall say?" Ross asked.

Eames looked back over her shoulder towards Bobby.

"She wants to see his old x-rays before she'll sign off," he said quietly. "She also brought in the photo reconstruction of the young boy. We've sent it out to the school district, and all the precincts."

"The lab found some 9mm shell casings, which they're running now." Eames added.

"Alright," Ross sighed and leaned back in his chair. "Get me a summary in two hours. I've got to brief the Chief at the end of the day and when he finds out Marsten is ex-cop, he'll want to run with it."

"Okay," Eames rose from her chair.

"What do you think the chances are of solving this?" Ross asked and then pinned her with a look.

Eames shrugged. "Its old, Captain. We haven't been able to tie them all together yet. I think it'll depend on whether we can ID those immigrants."

Ross turned his gaze on Goren. "What about you?"

"This was planned in meticulous detail," Goren answered. "It went undetected for four years. Even if we can ID every body, finding the murderers is gonna be a stretch..."

* * *

While Eames was down in the forensics lab, Goren reviewed the information that Jason Redding had gathered for them. Redding was a newly minted detective headed for Narcotics and just back from a tour in Iraq. He'd managed to survive that ordeal, only to break his foot crossing the street two days after receiving his gold shield. So, he'd been temporarily re-assigned to Major Case, answering the phones and gathering info for the other detectives. When Goren and Eames asked him to do a little phone work on their behalf, he'd jumped at the chance.

Goren was impressed with the quality of the Redding's report. It was detailed but precise, and he'd gone the extra mile of tracking down the driver who'd delivered the building supplies to the warehouse. The supplies had been paid for in cash. All the driver could remember was that it was a 'big, black guy in a suit with a funny accent'.

Goren's search request of tax and property records had finally arrived. At the time of the murders the building had been owned by Alexander Holdings Ltd. He picked up the form and strolled over to Redding's desk. Redding's left foot, encased in a walking cast, was propped on an open desk drawer while he talked on the phone.

"No kidding...uh huh...really." He held one finger up to indicate that he'd only be a moment longer. "That's great, Franny. Thanks a bunch."

He dropped the receiver back into the cradle. "Phone company. Franny's going to try and get us the LUDs from Marsten's home phone."

"Worth a shot. Thanks for the work on the building supplies," Goren said and held out the sheet of paper. "I've got another job for you if you're interested."

"You bet," Redding grinned and snatched the sheet from Goren's hand. "I'm already going a little nuts just sitting here."

"Ah, that explains it." Goren placed his palms on Redding's desk and leaned in so that he could lower his voice. "That interview you did...with the driver...you did that in person, didn't you?"

Redding smiled slightly. "A guy's got to eat. Can I help it if I happened to pick the same diner the driver likes?"

"Just don't let Ross catch you," Goren rapped his knuckles on the desk. "You're on desk duty for a reason."

"You're telling me to follow orders." Redding's face was a mixture of surprise and disbelief.

"No," Goren sighed and gave him a wan smile. "I'm asking you to learn from my mistakes." He rose to his full height and began to turn away, but stopped and pointed one finger at the sheet in Redding's hand. "See what you can find on Alexander Holdings."

* * *

By the end of the day, Goren and Eames had been through the evidence belonging to George Marsten, and the hard drive from his computer had been sent down to Technical Assistance for analysis. Forensics hadn't found anything of significance, no unidentified fingerprints, no drug residue, no blood, and no unidentified fibres. And, they were still working on the evidence and shell casings from the crime scene.

Although Goren had done his best to light a fire under INS, they still hadn't managed to match the unidentified remains to anyone in their database, nor had they heard from any of the other groups they had contacted. They had both typed up their case notes, and Eames had given copies and a summary to Ross hours ago.

When Eames returned from the canteen, she found Goren in the conference room he had taken over. He was sprawled in a chair, head lolling on the back of the chair staring at the ceiling. It was a pose she hadn't seen in years, if he moved a fraction of an inch he'd slide off onto the floor.

"I heard they're going to paint the ceiling in here," she said. "You better start copying your notes now."

He snickered and heaved his body into a sitting position. "This is frustrating..." he sighed.

"We've got a crime in an isolated area, that apparently nobody witnessed, with victims we can't identify. We've got no motive. We don't even know if the target was Marsten or one of the others? "

"Jeez, Bobby, we're only three days in here." Eames crossed her arms and leaned against the table. "We still haven't got all the forensics back yet. And you said it yourself, this is already four years old, it's not like there's any rush..."

"Yeah...," he left the thought hanging. "You got plans for the weekend?"

"I'm babysitting," she grinned. "And, there's a family thing on Sunday. What about you?"

"I've got...stuff to do tomorrow," he said casually, "And I told Lewis I'd come out to look at his new project."

"There you go." Eames said and waved one hand at him. "Leave the case until Monday, and enjoy your weekend. Maybe something will turn up."

"Maybe...something will," he rose from the chair and followed her out the door. "So, your nephew... he'll be five this year, right?"

* * *


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: Except for Laura, they all belong to Dick Wolf

Author's Note: I know this one took a little longer to post and I thank you for your patience.

* * *

Chapter Six - Day Four

It was a beautiful Saturday morning, clear blue sky and warm sunshine. You could even hear the birds singing over the sounds of city traffic. Unfortunately, I was stuck in the morgue peering at tiny fragments of bone under the microscope. No wonder my eyesight is so bad. I'd been at it for close to four hours when my cell phone rang.

"Laura Westfall," I said.

"Robert Goren," came the reply.

"Good morning, Detective." I could feel a smile tugging at the corners of my lips. "Is this business or pleasure?"

"Both," he answered. "And I thought you agreed to call me Bobby."

"That depends on if this is business or pleasure. If its business that warrants Detective." I swivelled back and forth in the chair I occupied. "When we get to the pleasure part of the conversation, then I'll call you Bobby."

"Fair enough," he chuckled. "Have you finished analysing the bone fragments... Professor?"

"I'm just about finished and I haven't found a damn thing," I replied. "It would be a lot easier if I had the skulls to match them to."

"They're probably at the bottom of the Hudson," he mused. "Well, it was a long shot at best."

"Uh huh." I could be really eloquent when I tried. "I don't suppose you heard from INS yesterday."

"No. I don't expect we'll see anything from them until Tuesday, Monday if I get lucky."

I bit my tongue. Lucky...ooh...I could imagine several different scenarios and closing my eyes didn't help to block out the images. So, I opened them and focussed on the skeleton hanging in the corner.

"Laura, are you still there?"

"Sorry, I got distracted."

"Right." he drawled, as much as a native New Yorker could. "I asked if you wanted to join me for a walk and maybe get some lunch."

"Sure, Bobby, I'd love that." I gushed. Why is it that when a good-looking, sexy man asks a woman out, she turns into a semi-literate puddle of goo?

"Great. I'll be there in five minutes."

"Five minutes," I squeaked. "Where are you...the parking lot?"

"Just pulling in now."

I hung up. If he'd designed that to throw me off balance, he'd certainly succeeded. Or, was he that eager? He'd said he'd phone, but if I had known he was going to appear in person I would have worn something more elegant, maybe not my fancy cocktail dress, but something more appropriate than jeans and cotton shirt. But it didn't really matter, the end result was the same. I scurried around like a squirrel storing nuts for the winter, returning the bone fragments to storage, setting the room to rights, and checking to make sure my hair wasn't standing on end or that the minimal makeup I wore hadn't vanished. I'd just returned my lipstick to my purse when he strolled through the doors.

"You hung up on me."

He was dressed casually, jeans, dark t-shirt and a light cotton jacket. The fuzzy stubble was gone and he looked rested. It made him look younger.

"Yes, I did." I confessed. "You surprised me."

His lips stretched into a smile. "Good to know."

"What? That I can be surprised?"

"That I can sneak up on you."

"You managed that two days ago." Damn, that was perhaps more information than he needed to know. More than any man that I had ever met he had managed, with no apparent effort, to capture my full and complete attention. I hadn't seen or spoken to him since dinner, but I'd found my attention wandering back to that occasion, and him, several times since Thursday evening.

He paused for a moment, turning my admission over in his mind and then he smiled. "Come on, I'll buy you lunch."

"Isn't it my turn," I asked. "To buy you lunch."

"Call me old fashioned," he shrugged. "But, I generally like to pay when I ask a beautiful woman out...on a second date."

Holey crap, he did it again. I fanned my hand in front of my face. "All that fancy talk...date...beautiful..."

"Oh knock it off," he gently took my arm and steered me towards the door. "Besides, I'm just getting warmed up, you haven't heard anything yet."

I suddenly had this clear image of Bobby's lips whispering 'sweet nothings' in my ear. My heart skipped a beat. How warm did he have to be, I wondered. I managed, just barely, not to voice that thought.

"So, where are we going?" I asked instead. Yes, that was infinitely safer.

"You'll see." He said mysteriously.

He held the door as we exited the building and this time his hand was firmly in contact with my back as he guided me across the parking lot. Sitting next to my pickup was a vintage Mustang convertible, top up, in a dark moss green.

"Oooh, nice car," I cooed. I always was a sucker for a vintage muscle car, comes from growing up in a male-centric environment.

"Thank you," Bobby answered looking very pleased with himself. "I finally finished it."

I leaned in the driver's window for a closer look. The interior was black leather, and smelled new. It was so pretty it was almost a shame to sit in it. "Is it a '66 or '67?"

"'66." He leaned down beside me to peer in the window. He smelled even better than the car, a wonderful mix of exotic woods and spices. "How do you know so much about Mustangs?"

"Mark had a '78 Cobra."

"Who's Mark?" His voice suddenly got tight, the delivery clipped.

I turned my head to look at him. Was that a flash of jealousy? I leaned my hip on the car and tried to repress a smile. "Technically, he's my uncle but he's only ten years older than me, so he's more like a brother."

"Oh."

I couldn't tell if he was sheepish or relieved, or some combination of the two, but whatever he was feeling it certainly inflated my ego. I guess I'd made an impression...a big one.

"So, am I gonna get a ride?"

His lips twitched and the keys dangled from one long finger. "What you don't want to drive?"

"Not today," I snorted. I am so ladylike. "I'm going to play gawky tourist while you do all the driving. Besides you won't tell me where we're going."

He guided me around the car and held the door while I settled myself into the passenger seat. In a couple of quick strides, he was around the car and sitting behind the wheel. As we pulled out onto the street I thought, I really should've taken him up on the offer to let me drive... if only to give my hands something to do. Instead I held them primly in my lap, and tried not to touch...anything.

* * *

Over dim sum, he launched his attack. She had sketched out the bare bones of her life the other night, but now he wanted details. "So how come you never married?"

She paused, chopsticks and the dumpling they held, halfway to her lips. "Do you always interrogate your dates?"

"No," he answered thoughtfully. "Only the ones I like."

"I'd hate to see what you do with the others," she said. "And, why would you ask out someone you didn't like?"

"You're evading the question." He pointed his chopsticks at her and then took another dumpling from the basket.

She set the dumpling and chopsticks back on her plate and wiped her hands on her napkin. "The closest I got was living with someone for nearly a year."

"What happened?"

She sipped her green tea. He waited patiently.

"Vancouver," she sighed and gently replaced the cup on the table.

He looked at her, his brows knitted in a puzzled expression. "Come again?"

"Pig farmer...26 missing women..."

"Jesus..." he gulped his beer. It had been in the New York papers and on the local news for weeks and all he could think was 'Thank god it wasn't here'.

"A friend was doing the forensics. They were swamped. Anyway, I agreed to help out with the IDs." She picked up the tea cup, and swirled the pale liquid within, before setting it down again. "I guess Grant finally got tired of me getting mysterious phone calls in the middle of the night and then disappearing for days on end. He scuttled off to a new job in California."

"He was an ass."

"Aw, you say the sweetest things," she smiled. She picked up her chopsticks and deftly retrieved the dumpling. "What about you?" she asked before she bit into the succulent morsel.

"Same story, the job...and other things always got in the way."

"Other things," she teased. "Are you going to tell me what those are?"

"Eventually," he said. He wasn't about to tell her about his family issues at this stage. It was too soon...too risky. "What made you take the job at Hudson? It's not exactly a hotbed of forensic anthropology. You could've found a position at a more prestigious institution."

She raised an eyebrow, and finished chewing the rest of her dumpling. He was full of questions. "I needed to be here...in New York. Hudson was just a very fortunate coincidence."

She crossed her arms and leaned on the table. "My friend, Isabel, lives upstate, she lost her husband a couple of years ago in an accident, and she's developed some health issues. She's got two little girls, and I'm their guardian in case something happens to her. She's got no else, except her dad, and he's in his eighties. They're my family, along with Mark and his wife and kids. It was just time for me to come home."

"You don't have other family?" he asked. "Are your parents still living?"

"I was raised by my grandparents but they died years ago. I've got a couple of half-brothers, but I never see them," she sighed sadly. "Dad was killed in Viet Nam when I was five, and my mother..." She grimaced and rolled her eyes. "About two months after Dad died, my mother left me with Grandma and Grandpa and ran off. She moved to Chicago, met another man, got married. I only spent a handful of holidays with her and her new husband, and once they had their boys, I spent less and less time there because I wasn't welcome. My mother's been dead for years and I still have issues with her."

At that point, a cell phone began to ring. "Sorry, that's me. I forgot to turn it off," Laura reached into her bag for the offending object. She checked the display. "It's one of Isabel's girls...do you mind?"

He shook his head. "Go ahead."

She flipped open the phone and put it to her ear. "Hey, kiddo, what's up?"

While she spoke, Bobby thought about what she had said. It appeared that they had a lot in common, both children of difficult mothers, and absent fathers. In his case, most of the issues with his mother were created by her illness. It sounded like Laura's mother had made a conscious decision to abandon her daughter. It was one of the few times in his life that he thought himself lucky to have had his mother. At least she had tried. And, as far as their fathers went, he wondered, was it better to have your father die when you are very young, or was it better to have a father that spent most of his life ignoring your existence?

"Next weekend...yeah, I can do that. I'll call Carole later and let her know I can come," Laura smiled crookedly at him and shrugged. "Really...uh huh...Look sweetie," she interrupted, "I'm having lunch with a friend can I call you later?"

"Take your time," he said softly, but not quietly enough that his voice didn't carry over her phone.

"Yes..." she rolled her eyes. "Yes...at work." She suddenly pulled the phone away from her ear. He could hear muffled squealing emanating from the small device. "I'm hanging up now," she said sharply. "No, you cannot talk to him...no, absolutely not, and you tell your mother I heard that." She turned the phone off and snapped it shut.

"It will now be going out on jungle drums that Auntie Laura is on a date." She sighed and rested her chin on her fist. "When I go up there next weekend I'll be interrogated by a horde of ten and twelve year old girls."

"A horde?" His lips twitched, trying not to laugh. "I thought there were just two of them."

"I'm going up to instruct the 4H club on the finer points of barrel racing. The boys all want to know about dead bodies, and the girls all want to know about my love life and living in the Big City. I think they've been watching too much television."

"Ah," he drained the last of his beer. "Interesting contrast. And what did your friend Isobel say?"

"Something about 'miracles'," she grimaced.

He smirked. "Glad I could help...spice things up."

"You laugh now," she pointed across the table at him. "I'll give them your phone number."

"Better not," he threatened. "That cell is department issue." He could imagine Ross blowing a gasket when hordes of giggling girls flooded his cell with irrelevant calls.

"Better yet," she continued, and grinned evilly, "I just bet you've never been interrogated by ten and twelve year old girls. I could just drag you up there and throw you to the pack..."

"Oh...no," he waved a hand wildly, laughing. "You leave me out of it. That's not an interrogation...that's torture."

* * *

Somewhere between the restaurant and the Esplanade, he had taken her hand. They blended in with all the other couples out strolling along the waterfront, enjoying the cool breeze off the bay and the warm sun beating down. They pausing every now and again to study the sculptures or to examine the gardens. Eventually, they found themselves in a quiet spot. Across the harbour, Liberty gleamed white in the distance, and the sun reflected off the choppy water. He released her hand and leaned casually against the railing, but there was tension in his back and shoulders. He was bracing himself for something. "There's some things you should know about me," he said quietly.

"Okay." She'd heard all the rumours and she thought she knew what was coming. She turned her back to the view and rested her elbows on the railing. If she shifted just a millimetre, she would collide with his shoulder.

"You know I'm not the most popular person in the Department, with the brass or with some of the cops. I was suspended for six months for insubordination, disobeying orders, and running an unsanctioned undercover operation." He turned his head and found he was eye to eye with her. They were blue today. "On top of that, while I was still suspended I found out about some dirty cops working with drug dealers, and I turned them in."

"You've been busy and, according to my sources, very lucky."

"I wouldn't have pegged Rodgers for a gossip." He held his breath. She wouldn't have revealed anything about his secret DNA test, would she?

"She never said a word," Laura answered evenly. "She thinks you're a colossal pain in the ass, but she likes you. Most of what I heard, right or wrong, came from Phil and Gene, they're big fans, and some of the other staff. Half of them think you're nuts, and the other half think you're...very entertaining," she said and grinned at him over her shoulder.

He grunted in response and turned back to the water. "You know the Chief of D's calls me the Whack Job."

"Does he? Well, I've met him and he's a self-serving asshole," her voice dripped with disgust. She turned, folded her arms on the railing, and leaned against his arm. She grinned evilly. "I always thought that the physical anthropology lab would be a good place to hide a body. Do you think anyone would notice if he suddenly disappeared?"

"Depends on who you ask," he raised one eyebrow and his lips twitched.

"And, I'll call your Whack Job and raise you a Grim Reaper," she waved one hand out over the water. "My particular favourite is The Fourth Horseman. Some of my dear loving students came up with that one."

"Very...creative. You look nothing like him." He pushed off the railing, and laid a hand on her shoulder to steer her down the walk. This time his hand was firmly placed against her back. They turned along a side path that was screened from the main walkway by shrubbery.

"So why did you do it," she asked. "Why did you take such a huge risk?"

"I had to," he answered quietly. "In the first case, my nephew made the complaint and it was the only way to investigate the abuse at the prison without someone there finding out, and in the second case, it was the only way I could get my badge back."

She nodded slowly. "Well, I'm glad you're okay." She trailed her fingers through the roses along the path. The delicate scent wafted through the air.

"That's it?" he asked. "No other comments...opinions?"

"I'm hardly the one to pass judgement," she shrugged. "I've been tossed out of countries because of my inability to shut up, or follow directions."

"That's different though," he said. "You're dealing with human rights abuses... genocide..."

"The scale doesn't matter," she interrupted, shaking her head. "One wrong is still too many."

"Idealist."

"It takes one to know one," she poked his chest with a finger. "If Robert Goren was running the world, we'd both be out of work."

"Maybe," he chuckled. At the end of the path sat a lone bench. With a subtle tug on her arm, he pulled her onto the bench next to him. She tucked one leg underneath her and turned to face him. He laid one arm along the back of the bench, and studied her.

"What is it?"

"I'm just looking..." he answered. "I'm finally going to figure out how those eyes of yours work." Her lips twitched in amusement as he placed two fingers under her chin, and gently shifted her face back and forth. Her irises were actually two colours; an inner ring of clear green and an outer ring of blue. He made a satisfied noise.

"Well, what do you see?" she asked.

"I see...a beautiful, brilliant, honest...passionate woman." His hand slid along her throat, his thumb coming to rest under her chin and his fingertips on her carotid artery. "Who I really want to kiss."

"It's about damn time," she said. "I thought I was gonna have to knock you on your ass...or find a step ladder."

He grinned crookedly. "Bold, swears like a sailor..."

"Well, I can think of one way to shut me up." She placed a hand on his chest, and then let it slide up to his throat. She curled her fingers around the neck of his t-shirt, her fingertips raking through hair and caressing his skin, and pulled. That was all the encouragement he needed.

It was a delicate kiss, full of nuance and promise. She let him lead, but she met each of his caresses with equal intensity. One hand was still tangled in the collar of his shirt, her fingers stroking his bare skin, the other kneaded his bicep. Just before everything tipped over the edge into ragged passion, he pulled back.

"Where the hell did you come from?" he murmured huskily. He could feel her blood pounding in the pulse point below her jaw.

"Nebraska." She grinned at him.


End file.
